The Universe that Discovered Itself

I don't intend this post to start a debate on religion please! In fact it's not even about religion. Please don't try to hijack the thread to spread your brand of religion, thanks It's about the possible existence of a very intelligent but still generic force. I may have given the impression before, that I am an atheist. Looking it up on Webster's it says "one who denies the existence of God" to which I say "Duh! Could you be more vague?" Which God? Who's God? Is it a man or a woman, blah, blah, blah... So I don't know if I'm an atheist or not. May you'll help me decide About 10 years ago I read more than a few books all by physicists, some of them cosmologists that were wondering about the apparent coincidences in the physical universe that we know, without which life (and therefore consciousness) would not have happened. Sure there could have been a perfectly barren universe with rocks hitting each other all the time (gravitational constant) or atoms never forming in a stable fashion (electrical constant) or who knows if even stable nuclei would have formed (strong and weak forces). Also there's the carbon cycle inside stars of which I don't remember the details but it turns out that it is extremely lucky in the production of the necessary carbon. If any of the above mentioned constants would have been slightly, and I mean very slightly different from what they are, something would have broken as I said before, and the phenomenon of life would have not developed anywhere. I whish I had the books so I could mention all the titles but I lost them all in 1998 in what I call, without further explanation, an apartment lease accident. :roll: Some of the authors were Borrow, Tippler, I remember "The Anthropic Cosmological Principle", ... etc. I was and still am convinced that there's something that gave birth to this Universe with the intent that this Universe would develop the necessary mechanisms to create a life form, from the elements created in same Universe that could one day acquire the consciousness to discover, e.g. that if the physical constants had been slightly different, this consciousness would not have developed. I think that whatever thing poped the Universe did it to observe itself through our eyes and consciousness. It's like looking into a mirror when It/we look into the stars. We are literally stardust. The elements that comprise our body were manufactured inside stars via natural alchemy, again only if certain constants had just the right values. According to my synthesis then, this "God" materialized itself into the physical Universe and therefor everything in it is part of It. Esp. us since we can discover the details of the Universe with our consciousness. Now, from that, to jumping to believe in the tenets of any organized religion is too HUGE a jump that I choose not to take. I'm more in agreement with the Mystics that acknowledge the unknowability of God and think that, since after all we are made of It, we can attune our Consciousness with It and gain insight and peace of mind. I claim that Abraham Maslow was referring to that as Peak Experiences. PS: I just did a search in Amazon to see what John D. Barrow was up to now, and I find this title!!The Universe that Discovered Itself !! Wow! That was ALL I was trying to say!! I'll have to title the thread that! Bye Bye! [ July 21, 2002: Message edited by: Tony Alicea ]

I was and still am convinced that there's something that gave birth to this Universe with the intent that this Universe would develop the necessary mechanisms to create a life form, from the elements created in same Universe that could one day acquire the consciousness to discover, e.g. that if the physical constants had been slightly different, this consciousness would not have developed.

I am an atheist. I deny the existence of an intelligent, all-powerful being that created this universe, and I deny that this universe has a reason for being. That is where I stand. Having said that, I am interested in knowing why you find that statement above to be plausible.

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posted Jul 19, 2002 15:33:00

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Well, you stand in more or less solid ground Thanks for the reply. I must admit that I also have been a student of the Western Esoteric Tradition in addition to the Cosmology that I mentioned with a humble BSc in physics...

I was and still am convinced that there's something that gave birth to this Universe with the intent that this Universe would develop the necessary mechanisms to create a life form, from the elements created in same Universe that could one day acquire the consciousness to discover, e.g. that if the physical constants had been slightly different, this consciousness would not have developed.

No *intent* is required really. As you mentioned above the Anthropic Principle adequately describes our situation. Modern cosmological theories (especially string theories) include a "many worlds" hypothesis, in which the number of "universes" that exist are potentially infinate. Each universe may have different laws of physics, constants, etc, that fundamentally affect how that "universe" would look and evolve. In many universes, the forces you describe are NOT in balance, and no life, or perhaps even "matter" as we know it, can exist there. The only reason we, as sentient beings in this universe, are able to pose the question "what is so special about this universe that we exist?" is that this particular universe had the necessary components to evolve sentient life to ask that question. If it hadn't , we wouldn't be here to ask, and there would be nothing "special" about this universe. The problem fundamentally takes care of itself, without the need to invoke some creative, anthropomorphic entity such as "God".

Rob
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Anthony Villanueva
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posted Jul 19, 2002 16:51:00

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Modern cosmological theories (especially string theories) include a "many worlds" hypothesis, in which the number of "universes" that exist are potentially infinate.

I don't think Hugh Everett's "many worlds" hypothesis is widely accepted in the physics community. The Copenhagen interpretation is still the mainstream orthodoxy.

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posted Jul 19, 2002 17:09:00

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My apologies, I actually wasn't refering to the Many Worlds theory that states that at the quantum level, when a particle has a choice to make about it changing some state, it in effect makes both choices, thus branching off into two universes. I meant "many worlds" in the sense that solving the equations for modern string theories seem to propose there are infinite solutions, and thus infinite possible universes, of which our universe is just one of many possible universes. But since "Many Worlds" does have this specific negative association I shouldn't have used those terms.

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posted Jul 19, 2002 18:21:00

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Rob: You hit the nail right in the head! I didn't want to say what you correctly stated about our universe being the one that "won the lottery" so I left it to see if anyone would come with it and then I would if no one else did. Indeed it may be that a great number of Universes (orthogonal to each other) have been created with nothing interesting resulting. But given a high enough number, there would be one like ours which was conducive to Consciousness and we then would think that we're special. It is as if "God" was practicing in her basement trying making Universes until she found the right mixture. Or maybe there is no God whatsoever... Or maybe there are no other Universes...

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posted Jul 19, 2002 18:26:00

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Wait Rob! Did you say "that solving the equations for modern string theories seem to propose there are infinite solutions..." Wow! Last time I looked (and it has been a while; I may have to start studying these things again) any theory that yielded infinity was discarded as no good. Which modern books do you recommend on modern cosmological theories? Thanks.

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posted Jul 19, 2002 20:33:00

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The inifinites are not solutions for a particular equation, rather, there seem to be an infinite number of equations that can be derived from the theories, each describing a self-consistent universe, although most of them aren't like any universe we live in. That's why they hypothesise that there may actually be an infinite number of universes. The results they get with the string theories that describe *our* particular universe do such a good job of explaning how things work, and are able to (almost) unify all the fundemental forces, that most people think string theory probably is the way to go; but if you accept this premise, you have to accept the fact that there are other possible solutions that describe universes totally unfamiliar to us. Two good books I'd recommend are "Hyperspace" by Michio Kaku, and "The Elegant Universe" by Brian Greene. [ July 19, 2002: Message edited by: Rob Ross ] [ July 19, 2002: Message edited by: Rob Ross ]

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posted Jul 19, 2002 20:43:00

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Thanks! One of the books that I read in the very early 1990s was by Michio Kaku and now I can't find the title in Amazon. Do you remember what it was? Jeez! I hate it when that happens!

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posted Jul 19, 2002 22:42:00

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Well "Hyperspace" came out in 1994, so it could be that. He also wrote a book with Jennifer Thompson in 1987 called "Beyond Einstein".

His book "Visions" was after "Hyperspace", and it's more about the future of humans than physics. He also has a graduate-level textbook "Introduction to Superstrings and M-Theory" which I haven't read, because it's technical and I'm not a theoretical physicist ;p

No, I just play one on JavaRanch Actually I'm a computer scientist, and I like science in general. I've always loved astronomy, and I devour every lay book on cosmology that comes out. I wish I had a formal math background though so I could understand some of the more technical publications.

Team, I have a simple question . Someone here says that there is no God("universal force") and he does believe this strongly. What is the basis for such a belief ? Regards Suchak Jani

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posted Jul 21, 2002 14:42:00

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Suchak: Welcome to the discussion. It wasn't me who said it but really, in my opinion, the burden is on the one that says that there is a God. The person that doesn't believe has simply not seen any convincing (to him or her) proof. I may have a reason to believe if for example, there is only one Universe instead of an infinite number. For now I'll believe there's only one although I admit the case for an infinite number is not bad. The problem is that as I understand these theories, there is no way of knowing. About not more than five minutes after thinking about that yesterday, I played a video tape with the last minutes of an episode of Outer Limits (SciFi) that I had recorded days before. In less that ten seconds the following words were said by the two characters: 1) "I think we'll never know." 2) "I guess it's all a matter of faith."

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posted Jul 21, 2002 18:20:00

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What I find most exciting about life is that we don't really know what we can, or cannot, ever know. Science is the search for explaning how things work. There is much we can't observe, but we don't know if it's unknowable, or if we just don't have the sufficient technology or understanding in our current civilization. Also, are some problems just too complicated for our human brains to fathom? Perhaps. But we never seem to run out of new things to discover, and this is likely to continue for some time. I have to think for example, the concept of being able to travel to other star systems is going to be a vital key in the survival of our species. We currently can barely lift a few people up into low-earth orbit right now; just being able to zip to pluto in an afternoon is unfathomable. But, maybe someday we'll discover something about the universe that lets us get around our current understandings of its travel limitations. I wonder how the first sea explorers made the gutsy decision to keep going over the horizon just to see what was there. I'm sure that for most people at some point in the ancient past, all that water presented an impenetrable barrier at the end of the world. But someone challenged that idea. Maybe lots of people died before they successfully landed on some distant shore. Over 100 years ago, Jules Verne wrote "From Earth to the Moon" about how a group of scientists built a huge cannon to shot a projectile into space and orbit the moon. At the time, the concepts of orbital mechanics were well understood, but they really didn't have a clue how to go about actually making a machine to land there. For most people it was probably "impossible." But we found a way to overcome our limitations and have landed people up there. So I agree that there is much we don't know, but we don't actually know what is unknowable, so there's no reason to assume something can never be known, just because it isn't known to us right now. I have faith that eventually all questions can be answered.

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posted Jul 21, 2002 18:37:00

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Dear Tony, Please forgive my spelling mistakes, i was never good at grammer. Please accept my aplologies if i did say something that was not palatable in my previous post.Tony, frankly i am impressed by your truthfullness in answering the question. That is a sign of genuine humility. CLIP In less that ten seconds the following words were said by the two characters: 1) "I think we'll never know." 2) "I guess it's all a matter of faith."

/CLIP I will try and address the above as well as what you have said in the post one by one.1. "I think we'll never know." Yes it is true that we will never know but, in our present material environment and thinking. Why? We think that "seeing is believing." Show me GOD and i will believe you ? right Example:- Now i have read that the president of the unites states exists. I say to you that i do not belive this. Show him to me. You think the president will come with you just so that you could show him to me ? just so that i can believe ? GOD by definition, if He/She exists is far more superior to the president of the united states who is one of the most powerful man in the world today. Now what about all the people who have seen him and have first hand experiance of him(the president). I say why should i believe them ? why ? Show me the president and only then i will believe. There are lot more people,saints, masters accoss religions in the course of history and even today who are of impeccable character and who have seen GOD and have experianced GOD. Has any one of us seen the mind ? Do we belive it exists? I could go on and on on this one(seeing is believing). I will come back to the knowing part after the shedding light on the second point. 2) "I guess it's all a matter of faith." Yes , but it is not blind faith. It is faith based on experiance.Example:- Let's say you live in USA , but you have never been to florida. (I would love to go and swim with all this summer heat!, anyway). So you go to AAA and het your free triptick(cool!). The map says that there will be this town after x miles then the other town etc,. You have faith and belive that the map is right. When one town comes , then the next just as the map explains, your faith increases that yes you will reach the right destination. It is faith based on real tangiable experiance and not BLIND FAITH. The same way there is a process to realize GOD and it is based on what the previous sages/masters have perfected and based on our folloowing that process we get confirmation that yes we are on the right path. Not BLIND FAITH. Coming back to the first pioint now i have another example.Example:- Let's say you go to the amazon and find a tribe there deep in the forest who have not seen mordern civilization.They are very nice, geuine friendly people and over time you can communicate with them. One day you being an aerospace engineer start explaining the intricate details of jet planes and technology. What will they say. They have no experiance of any man flying ever ? They will have a difficult time believing you , even though they are very friendly and nice people and like you very much. Their frame of referance is different. Similarly we have no referance of trancendance , what to speak of knowing GOD. However as i have mentioned previously , there are so many mastere/sages throughout history and even today with impeccable character who have seen GOD ,experianced him/her. Lastly, think about this one, Whenever we have any bodily problem we see the doctor and accept him and his presciption on faith, not blind faith. Similarly to learn about geometry,physics,sciences etc we approrach am appropriate professor and accept his advice. However , the mistake we make is when it come to GOD we become all knowledgable as pass judgements which may are may not be right. The process of GOD realization is also a process , a higher science and it has it's own teachers and it would help us to try and understand from them. Hope this is usefull to read. Regards Suchak JaniIn the post where i say him i imply him/her.

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posted Jul 21, 2002 19:01:00

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Suchak: I will be paying a lot of attention to:"It is faith based on real tangible experience and not BLIND FAITH." Thanks for the thoughtful post

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posted Jul 21, 2002 19:40:00

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I thank God/Allah/Buddha/Whoever/Whatever for the inconceivable chain of events that led to the invention of the Pizza.

And Warcraft III. May God/Allah/Buddha/Whoever/Whatever (if He/She exists) bless those good people at Blizzard. Just keep 'em coming... I feel that a profession of disbelief is as much an act of "faith" as a profession of an orthodox creed. IMO a believer has an equal right to demand of an atheist a justification of his stance. But don't ask me for strictly logical reasons that prove by necessity the non-existence of God, because I don't know any. (Sartre has one in Being and Nothingness, but it's not convincing, and I swear that book is indigestible ) I disbelieve because I find it simply incredible that an omnipotent, benevolent God chooses to reveal His Nature and Will in such a incoherent, garbled message. There are sects among schisms among religions, most proclaiming to be the one true way, sometimes engaging each other in bloody jihads and crusades in His name. That somehow, beyond what our feeble intellects can grasp, everything will work out for the best, that this is actually the "best of all possible worlds" that His Wisdom can devise, is a bit too much to swallow. The meek does not inherit this earth. They lose their jobs because it is outsourced elsewhere. Blessed are the poor? The poor have been taking it since Adam bit the big one.

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posted Jul 21, 2002 19:54:00

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Hi Anthony: That's why I said in my original post above (the 1st one):"Now, from that, to jumping to believe in the tenets of any organized religion is too HUGE a jump that I choose not to take." That's what I was trying to avoid I was trying to state why I think there's "something". And that It just wanted to look at itself (not unlike the Sufi Mystics believe, BTW but I digress...) Nothing much more than that, he he...

Originally posted by Peter Kristensson: Aaargh! my brain explodes! =) 3 VISIBLE AND 1/0 INVISIBLE DIMENSIONS How many dimensions do we have anyway? /Peter

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posted Jul 22, 2002 00:02:00

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According to M-theory at least 11, but the others are curled up in a closed loop of the order of the Planck length. This reminds of a show I used to watch when I was a kid -- I think it was Dr. Shrinker or something, when he had some sort of portal where you jump from one place to another using some sort of nebulous netherspace or something. Or maybe it was the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.

Originally posted by Tony Alicea: Which God? Who's God? Is it a man or a woman, blah, blah, blah...

I'd say that if you need a specific entity to exist so that you can have something to decide whether to deny it or not, you're in trouble. I'd follow the thought process through for you, but my brain hurts.

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posted Jul 22, 2002 01:15:00

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By Anthony Villanueva:According to M-theory at least 11

Alrigt, but if the universes are supposed to be orthogonal to each other then shouldn't there be a lot more than 11 dimensions in order to have a "great number". I'm not a physicist, but i have some fundamental maths in my bag, and this doesn't make sense. Or maybe I'm just mixing up all these theories that you keep throwing left and right

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posted Jul 22, 2002 06:15:00

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According to string theory, the other universes exist distinctly from this one, but they're not "orthogonal" to ours - they're unreachable from ours. Which is one big problem with string theory, at least for now, it seems to be making predictions about things that can't be proven/disproven, therefore some consider it "unscientific". The 11 dimensions however, are *real* spacial dimensions, and are each orthogonal to each other. We don't have explicit awareness of the "hidden" dimensions because they are so tiny, (smaller than a proton say in the same way our solar system is in comparison to the galaxy) . IE, *every* 3D point in "space" actually has an extra 7 dimensions, but since they're so tiny all material objects effectively occupy all the space in the extra dimensions, so we don't notice them. If we did, Sesame Street would get a lot more complicated, as we would have to add seven extra spacial comparison words in addition to our familiar "up/down", "left/right", and "forward/backwards."

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posted Jul 22, 2002 06:54:00

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First of all apologies for my somewhat flippant mail earlier on My bachelors degree was in Physics, and my original reason for studying Physics was because I like problems, I like looking for answers, especially to some of the questions raised here. In the end Ive concluded that perhaps its not worthwhile looking for such an answer, that is, looking to science to provide an answer to the question "Why am I here? How did I come to be? And what is my role in all of this?". My point (and I guess Im not putting it forward terribly well) is that if you concentrate too much on the big picture, you can lose focus on the finer things. Im not claiming to be a luddite, I believe that we should try and investigate the nature of the universe, through cosmology and the sciences. However we shouldnt accept was science brings as the final answer. Looking around, I see many people try to explain their worldview through athiesm, pure science, religions of all kinds. In the end, they are all equally valid viewpoints in that any of them cannot completely disprove the existance of any of the others. Bah. My head hurts. Mark

Ok. Not getting in too deep into science to prove existence of God. "The Universe that Discovered Itself." Trying to decipher this statement...'Universe' is God...and 'Itself' is also God. In other words, God is trying to discover himself (or herself or itself). We (humans) are part of Universe...and hence part of God...using all our knowledge about science we are trying to discover God. You can approach this either by assuming 'God exists' or by assuming 'God does not exist'. But, the point of convergence is always the same...God. All humans are not same....some can be very intelligent and knowledgeable to reach this point of convergence sooner (that is they can discover the TRUTH sooner). Hence become 'enlightened'..(also some say such people experience eternal BLISS).

My epilogue...God (or some power) exists. Its upto us to find out. But, remember, GOD is not Tangible or Obvious with mere eyes. Only way known so far to discover is to close your eyes and see Him INSIDE YOU...because you are part of Him and He exists in you also! Regards.

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posted Jul 22, 2002 12:44:00

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Rob:"but they're not "orthogonal" to ours - they're unreachable from ours." Thanks, Rob! That's what I also wanted to mean. I apologize to everyone for confusing the issue. I should be careful with the use of technical jargon in the presence of educated people... He he...Sorry!

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posted Jul 22, 2002 13:02:00

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Well, Gokul, whoever you are, you have made me come out of the Mystic closet. For me, the "religious" (if it can be called that; maybe not) philosophy that I find most affinity with (in fact the only one) is with Mysticism, which is what you just described. I hope I'm not thrown out of JavaRanch for my "coming out" and maybe having misled others... And so far my informal study of Cosmology (I also have a humble BSc in physics), does not contradict the philosophy that I follow, in any significant way. NEXT: How about that Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle? Is it physics confirmation of Free Will?! MORE AT ELEVEN!

I never really looked for a classification of what my beliefs would make me so I can't say for sure. My thoughts run something like what Tony and Gokul described although without all of the religious implications. There is life on earth because, as mentioned before, 'we won the lottery' (as an aside, I'm sure that there are other planets/lifeforms out there that have also won the lottery). There is some sort of force or power within the universe although I have my doubts that it is sentient or has thoughts, in my mind it is omnipotent but omniscient, more like a force of nature - it just is. We can try to find it but I don't think we'll be very happy with what we find. Disappointed might be a better word, in that I don't think we're going to find GOD. Unfortunately, this also leads me to the thought that all of those people out there looking for a meaning for life are in for a fairly large let down . Maybe mysticism is it, but the way Gokul described it there was to much religious connotation in it for me. Although, if it implies that meditating and stuff like that (I've not done any thing like it) can get you 'in tune' with this force then that would coincide with what I think. No, I'm not talking about 'The Force' from Star Wars, but it is an apt analogy for what I think. Maybe I should try meditating and then try to build a light saber?! [ July 22, 2002: Message edited by: Dave Vick ]

Dave

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posted Jul 22, 2002 15:40:00

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Human consciousness, though seemingly real, is just an illusion created from all our individual cells working together synergistically. Is an individual red blood cell a living organism? By all definitions, yes it is. What about a neuron? Same thing. But does the individual blood cell or my brain cell know its part of a whole named "Rob" that's sitting here typing this right now? I very much doubt it. How much more potential exists for the universe as a whole to have some kind of consciousness, based on the sum of its constituent parts, that we cannot fathom, just like the red blood cell or brain cell cannot conceive the concept that they are part of "me"? This allows for the possibility that the universe itself is conscious. I find comfort in this possibility.

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posted Jul 22, 2002 15:43:00

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Ah Jim! Nothing escapes you! I have to be more careful around you!

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posted Jul 22, 2002 16:17:00

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"How much more potential exists for the universe as a whole to have some kind of consciousness, based on the sum of its constituent parts, that we cannot fathom, just like the red blood cell or brain cell cannot conceive the concept that they are part of "me"?" But "me" can! The blood cell's job is well known; it contributes eventually to the "me" knowing the Universe. The blood's cell consciousness corresponds to its function: to carry oxygen around. It is conscious, through the forces of chemistry (electrical) of the nearby cells. The same of a simple atom like Hydrogen: One proton is aware of a nearby electron (cloud if you will) and together they form something more than the sum of themselves: A hydrogen atom. One "thing". And they are "conscious" of another via the electrical force. And that is the extent of their consciousness. Very basic. But this consciousness gets more complex as we get into single-celled organisms, then multi-celled organisms, etc. Until we reach the Human Being (or in other solar systems some other form of fully conscious life forms). I think We are the Universe becoming fully conscious of Itself. Finally.

That's why there's so much evil in the world, because we humans can actually do anything we want. I posit that the Great Architect of the Universe knew in advance that this would be the case but decided to explode into matter anyway. It knew this was the less bad of all possible worlds if It still wanted to manifest Itself. Maybe for narcissistic reasons? That we'll never know, I claim. I find it hard to believe so there must be another answer to the question "why something instead of nothing?" The same way, we humans can do a lot of good also. We may be here to correct the unavoidable "mistakes" that God made (I say it like that because I understand there's a Jewish statement to that effect but don't ask me where!) KABOOM! That's the sound of my brain exploding! (Come to think of it, a few brains have already exploded in this thread! Wear an apron while reading! )

How can a dimension be small? As far as I can tell, the three dimensions that I can see (and probably the fourth) are endless. What makes on dimension "smaller" than any others? -Stu Electrons would be great at choosing the door which a prize is behind. They just go through all three at once.

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posted Jul 23, 2002 11:30:00

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Since it's hard (even impossible) for us to visualize higher spacial dimensions it's usually easier to use a 2D example. If you take a piece of paper, and draw a straight line with a pencil, you've created a 2-dimensional object, ie, the line has width and length (discount the fact that the graphite atoms on the paper also have height ) If you can imagine an infinately thin line, such that the width approaches zero, but not quite zero, it would be impossible to tell the difference between that line, and no line, ie, it would be too small width-wise to be seen. Another way to think about it is that space is continuous and close, so it forms a loop, like the surface of our planet - you can go forward in a straight line and eventually end up right back at the point you started from. The distance you would have traveled on the Earth's surface is about 25,000 miles. On Mars, your distance would be smaller. On pluto, smaller still. Think about walking around the circumference of an atom. Then a sphere so small that it makes a proton look like as big as our milky way galaxy in comparion to it's circumference - you would still be traveling through space, but the amount of space is so infinitesimly small that for our human perceptions, it's virtually non-existent.

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posted Jul 23, 2002 22:34:00

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If you're really interested, you could try the "official" website. They have their own forums too . You can also try the one at CalTech. Finally, for the technically inclined, you can download preprints from Los Alamos.